The AnkhMorpork Inferno
by Howls By Night
Summary: a small attempt of mine to show a slice of life in Ankh-Morpork


I do not own anything to do with The Discworld, this is merely an attempt of mine to pay a small amount of homage to the great Pterry, I do however own Vinnie, hehe.  
  
The Ankh-Morpork Inferno  
  
Three unconnected events recently prompted me to reassess the way I look at Ankh-Morpork. One was the fact I was returning from the relative calm of Uberwald after visiting the pack. Two was that I had been reading Mr. DaQuirm's Inferno, and three was a sudden spell of hot weather. I suddenly realised that Ankh- Morpork IS Hell.  
  
There are seven distinct levels to the purgatory that is Ankh-Morpork. The outer level is in the form of a massive black ring that circles the boiling core. Some call this ring Acheron, but most know it as the black loam fields that stretch for many miles. Around this ring, the souls of the damned tootle along in an attempt to plough the stuff, thus gaining money and access to the inner levels, driven by the erroneous belief that things will be better there. They are not.  
  
The air throughout the Ankh-Morpork inferno's perpetually tainted with noxious fumes and choking vapours that scarify the lungs and tear the eyes. Filth, black, flapping shapes fill the air, diving amongst the throng to scavenge for scraps or to die messily beneath the crushing wheels of speeding carts as they swerve to avoid the killer black cabs that plough relentlessly through the streets, slaying all in their path.  
  
A black-hearted river runs through the centre of perdition. A stinking, oozing mass crossed at intervals by crumbling bridges beneath which The Gods' bankers swing on creaking ropes.  
  
There is a stark, bony figure on one side of this river dressed all in black. He approaches lost souls who are encouraged to press a silver coin into his skeletal hand, whereupon he will furnish them with a copy of the Ankh-Morpork times.  
  
The next level is a scattered domain. Here and there throughout the inferno you will find the piteous huddles of those whose sin was the sin of penury. These wretches skulk in filthy corners in pools of excrement muttering forlorn supplications to any that will listen. No one ever does. There is no compassion in Hell.  
  
Then there is the dread level of hedonists. This is a vast warehouse into which thousands upon thousands of souls are herded and crushed. They are then fed a demonic potion that dooms them to dance until they drop to the rhythmic pounding of Hell's generators, otherwise known as Music With Rocks In, under the coruscating flashes of the chthonic welders who are forever busy, building the hurtling metal boxes in which the mad, teeming souls of the outer level are to be imprisoned.  
  
The next tier is but a room. This is the level of the malcontents. Those who are dissatisfied with their state of mind. These wretches are fated to sit around a table and listen to the interminable babble of nonsense they generate as demons feed them an endless stream of tainted drugs through their noses. The room resounds with the vapid details of grand schemes that will come to nought and impassioned entreaties for some of the good stuff that made them feel OK for twenty seconds all those years ago.  
  
Yet another level is known as Merchant Street where diverse souls are damned to search endlessly for something worth having at a reasonable price. If they succeed they will attain salvation. No one yet has.  
  
The cheap trill seekers have a level all to themselves, for their title is in itself a paradox. In certain red-hued back streets, sad individuals scurry from shadow to shadow, regaled from dark doorways by the strident entreaties of painted succubi, seeking a glimpse of beautiful female flesh and a decent drink. They will find neither, but are eternally doomed to pay dearly for weak scumble and cellulite under the watchful gaze of a massive hublander called Vinnie, who carries a spare set of teeth for checking the quality of gold and a club with a nail in it.  
  
There are subsidiary torments for those who finally manage to escape the confines of the endless ring around purgatory. Once inside, they are doomed to drive down endless narrow streets patrolled by sour-faced demons in uniform whose only purpose is to prevent these exhausted, tormented souls from ever stopping.  
  
Those desperate enough to attempt a halt are cruelly hobbled with heavy iron boots and left there, immobilized for eternity.  
  
There is a freezing hell for those guilty of the sin of growing old. They are banished to concrete towers of ice with nothing but a constant stream of final reminders to burn for fuel. However, they have no matches and can only ignite the bills when young demons slip firebombs under the door. These sad souls are dying from the cost of living.  
  
Throughout the Ankh-Morpork Inferno you will find the thief dens. Here, anything left unattended for more than five seconds will disappear forever (with a fully signed receipt from the thieves guild of course).  
  
Those that escape the clawed snatchers are stopped by the roving officers of perdition in their stark black uniforms, who will rummage roughly through your soul for any sign of guilt. They rarely fail to perceive some evidence of culpability and regularly drag screaming souls of to their noisome dungeons where a peculiar kind of gravity causes their prisoners to fall endlessly down stairs (newly built) and walk into doors.  
  
Another stratum awaits the wannabes and poseurs who will find the gates to their imagined heaven barred by a large devil in a tuxedo who will repeat endless catechisms about a mythical list on which their names do not now, and never will appear. Their pathetic pleas involving "obvious mistake" and "don't you know who I am" forever fall on deaf and dispassionate ears.  
  
There is also a two-dimensional level to the inferno as thin as cheap paper. Here, everything is black and white and souls are ritually torn apart in print for the sin of being interesting. It is here that every bad iconograph anyone has ever had taken will appear. The demons that run this level of purgatory smell of smoke and whisky and suffix everyone's name with their incorrect age and marital status. Minos, minus the charm.  
  
This is the Ankh-Morpork Inferno. ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE 


End file.
